Saturday, March 28, 2009

Resume It or Kill It?

In Paul Krugman's most recent column in the NYT, he lays out his fundamental disagreement with the Obama financial vision, as he understands it:

In essence, the administration seems to believe that once investors calm down, securitization — and the business of finance — can resume where it left off a year or two ago....the underlying vision remains that of a financial system more or less the same as it was two years ago, albeit somewhat tamed by new rules.

As you can guess, I don’t share that vision. I don’t think this is just a financial panic; I believe that it represents the failure of a whole model of banking, of an overgrown financial sector that did more harm than good. I don’t think the Obama administration can bring securitization back to life, and I don’t believe it should try.